Coca-Cola Integrated Marketing Communications - Case Study Example

Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) of the Coca-Cola Brand

The Coca-Cola Company has an elaborate integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) for its famous brand, the Coca-Cola. The integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) of the company for the Coca-Cola brand entails the use of both conventional and unorthodox marketing strategies to drive a reliable agenda about the brand. Shimp and Andrews (2013: 112) states that between 2015 and 2016, the Coca-Cola Company embarked on robust marketing campaigns for its Coca-Cola soft drink in a bid to create a sense of happiness in the consumption of the product. The Coca-Cola Company has used such IMC tools as advertising, direct marketing, internet/interactive marketing, sales promotion, personal selling, and publicity/public relations, which are essential components of its promotional mix, to drive its synchronized marketing communications agenda (Glaser, 2008: 726-736). Based on the findings from the Coca-Cola IMC analysis from a practitioner and academic standpoints, certain recommendations can work for a future Integrated Marketing Communications campaign for Diet Coke. The Coca-Cola Company is dominant in the global soft drink industry, its consistent marketing communication strategies have enabled it to stay afloat for decades with the Coca-Cola brand leading the global market in terms of sales and publicity (Bhojanna, 2007: 229). This paper analyses the IMC of the Coca-Cola brand, giving suitable recommendations that work for a future Integrated Marketing Communications campaign for Diet Coke, including an agency brief for creative work for the future campaign for Diet Coke.

The Coca-Cola Company, being a multinational, integrates its marketing communications with a view of addressing its target customers, particularly with its Coca-Cola brand. Although the multinationals operates in a highly segmented market, its unique marketing mix has enabled it to retain its competitive edge over the years (Kotler, 2013: 1). In essence, the Coca-Cola Company is the pioneer of this kind of marketing because the multinational realized that it had to connect all its communication aspects in order to reach the target customers. Seemingly, the approach is working well for the company since the consumers respond well with every wave of advertisements (18). The company achieves this objective by creating a link between all its marketing communications so that the target customers can receive coherent, realistic, and harmonious communication regarding the products on offer. Owing to the variety of products (soft drinks) that the company offers, it opted to adopt an integrative approach in its marketing communication through close interaction with the customers (76).

Considering the complex nature of integrated marketing communications (IMC), the Coca-Cola Company takes into account several factors during the planning stage for its popular brand, Coca-Cola. The planning involves a careful analysis of the market, the nature of the society in which the subsidiary or the bottling company operates, the potential of the market with regard to the product, and the product positioning. These factors play an important role in determine the strategy that the company selects in linking all its communication plans before it embarks on a robust advertising campaign world over. The Coca-Cola Company is keen on market analysis at the planning stage because it usually has a unified marketing communication for all its global market without using specific advertising phrases for a particular target market. In most cases, all its global customers respond in a more or less similar way to the marketing communication that they receive through various media platforms (Bhojanna, 2007: 229).

Although the Coca-Cola Company varies its integrated its marketing communication from time to time, the multinational normally attempts to send a singular positive message to its global clientele. Perhaps the most common connotation in the Coca-Cola Company IMC is that consuming the company’s products, such as soft drinks, brings a positive feeling to the customers by lightening their mood. In essence, the company wants to be closer to the emotional feelings of its customers than never before. For that reason, the multinational constantly tailors its marketing communications to suit the integrated needs of its global clientele. Although the Coca-Cola Company has a diversity of products that it produced and distributes world over, its integrated marketing campaign for the Coca-Cola product is conspicuous, unique, and impressive in equal sense (Shimp & Andrews, 2013: 112).

According to Bhojanna (2007: 19), Coca-Cola is the most famous brand of the Coca-Cola Company, perhaps because it was one of the pioneer products by the multinational, which informs the approach that the company gives it when it comes to IMC. Fundamentally, Coca-Cola advertisements captivates audience world over, regardless of the communication channels used. Accordingly, the marketing communications for the Coca-Cola brand take an integrated approach in the sense that the company uses print, social, digital, and mass media to advertise the brand. The advertisement of Coca-Cola gives the impression that the consumption of the soft drink is associated with fun moments regardless of the situation. The robust marketing campaign by the company enables its global clientele to respond positively and continue consuming Coca-Cola. Although some of the existing soft drink and beverage companies like Pepsi Company struggle with the market, the Coca-Cola Company, through its robust IMC, is guaranteed of market even from the unborn.

According to Shimp and Andrews (2013: 112), the integrated marketing communication by the Coca-Cola Company ensures that its famous brand, Coca-Cola, through various Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) projects across the globe. The multinational understands the power of manipulating the emotional feelings of its existing and potential customers and it executes this strategy effectively. The company sponsors major global projects through its famous brand Coca-Cola, which creates a sense of emotional attachment to the global clientele. For example, the Coca-Cola Company uses its Coca-Cola brand to sponsor the world football governing body, FIFA, and the World Cup, a strategy that sends mixed emotional signals to the loyal customers of the company. Additionally, the company, through its Coca-Cola brand, has been on the forefront of sending rescue funds during such disasters as hurricanes and earthquakes as a way of showing solidarity with the people affected. Invariably, the multinational includes its Coca-Cola brand as part of the donations to the disaster victims as a way of consolation. This is an IMC aimed at touching the hearts of the Coca-Cola Company consumers to strengthen their loyalty with the company.

Between 2015 and 2016, the Coca-Cola Company drew an elaborate integrated marketing communication that entailed direct communication with the target customers. Besides the emotional appeal that has been conspicuous with the Coca-Cola brand, the company associates its brand with entertainment and fun. With the vast knowledge of the market as far as fun-loving and entertainment is concerned, the marketers at the multinational optimize their marketing opportunities to attract and retain more customers. Most of the global fun revolves around sports and entertainment. Accordingly, the company associated its brand with various musical artists and football clubs as a way of persuading customers to like the brand. When the customers see the Coca-Cola brand being associated with their favorite sports and entertainment, they are more likely to develop a positive attitude towards the brand and promote its sales globally (Glaser, 2008: 726-736).

Tools of IMC for Coca-Cola Brand

The Coca-Cola Company is keen on its promotional mix because it determines the level of public acceptance and sales as far as it chief brand, the Coca-Cola soft drink, is concerned. The integral components of the company’s promotional mix include advertising, direct marketing, internet/interactive marketing, sales promotion, personal selling, and publicity/public relations. Over the past decade, the Coca-Cola Company has focused on its promotional mix to maintain its competitive advantage in the market because the concept has proved to be an effective marketing communications strategy (Singh, 2014: 1116-1124). In essence, the company is both efficient and effective in the use of its promotional mix to synchronize the marketing communications for its principal product, the Coca-Cola. Accordingly, Coca-Cola is among the most appreciated brands in the world besides the fact that it leads the market as far as sales and global recognition is concerned. More often than not, consumers associate the Coca-Cola brand with corporate social responsibility (CSR) primarily because of the involvement of the brand in promoting both national and regional developments across the globe (Bhojanna, 2007: 229).

Advertising

The Coca-Cola Company employs various tools of integrated marketing communication (IMC) to achieve results, especially through its popular Coca-Cola brand. Advertising plays a significant role in connecting the consumers with the Coca-Cola brand because the brand is the most popular in the soft drink industry. The Coca-Cola Company puts more premiums on advertising Coca-Cola more than it does on any of its other brands. Perhaps that is the reason why the Coca-Cola brand is the best-selling soft drink in the world. Fundamentally, the advertisement of Coca-Cola involves an aggressive non-personal communication both at national and regional levels. The primary objective of advertising is to create awareness and build the image of the Coca-Cola brand (Shimp, & Andrews, 2013: 112).

The Coca-Cola Company is famous for her use of captivating slogans in the advertisements of its products, particularly Fanta and Coca-Cola. With such catchphrases as ‘A Memorable Journey’ and ‘open Happiness’, the Coca-Cola Company communicates how the interests of the customers blend with the company’s key brands like Coca-Cola. The advertising campaigns by the Coca-Cola Company have been consistent globally, particularly when it comes to the message and how it resonates with the customers. The advertisement slogans resonate with the needs of the people because the customers need to get an uplifting mood and feel reenergized by taking the soft drink offered by the company. Accordingly, the Coca-Cola Company has mastered the art of convincing it customers about the benefits of consuming Coca-Cola through the propagation of a consistent ‘feel-good’ message its marketing communications (Bruce & Solomon, 2013: 307-318).

Direct Marketing

When it comes to direct marketing, it is worth noting that the Coca-Cola approaches the concept from different perspectives, depending on the target market, location, and season. For instance the Coca-Cola Company partners with various hotels, movie theaters, restaurants and sports entertainment centers to sell the Coca-Cola brand upon entrance. The company may involve the parties in the contract or sell directly to the customers as they get entertained. The customers have no choice in such scenarios because they have only one brand on sale in such locations, which is the Coca-Cola brand. This strategy works for Coca-Cola by eliminating competition from other soft drink distributors within specific locations at given times. McDonalds and Pepsi are some of the beverage companies that have been unable to beat Coca-Cola in terms of competition through direct marketing (Chitty, 2011: 1, 103, 171).

Internet/Interactive Marketing

The advent of internet has provided the Coca-Cola Company with a platform to engage the customers of its products in interactive conversations, particularly since the 21st century. Although the multinational employed internet as an IMC tool in the late 20th century, the proliferation of wireless handheld mobile devices has boosted the integrated marketing communication of the company in relation to its primary brand, the Coca-Cola. Through the company’s website, internet users, who are principally its customers, can navigate to check the offers available and update themselves on new products that the company has launched or plans to launch in various parts of the world. Through the website, customers can navigate and understand the company in terms of its history, operation model, prices, products, and sponsorships. Additionally, internet users can interact with customer service desk through mail and chat, a marketing model that integrates all the company communications with regard to marketing (Bhojanna, 2007: 20).

Although email and chat are the primary interaction tools in the company’s website, the Coca-Cola brand is conspicuous in various contests, games, and shopping leads available at the site. Internet users can establish ways in which the community can benefit from their efforts through the website. The close interaction between the Coca-Cola Company and its customers enabled the multinational to markets its premium brand, Coca-Cola, among other brands that it distributes globally. Besides the company’s website, the Coca-Cola Company has been actively promoting its soft drinks, especially Coca-Cola, via various social media sites including Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. The social media platforms have enabled the Coca-Cola Company to integrate all its marketing communications in order to reach out to more customers through the internet. The greatest beneficiary of this effort has been the famous Coca-Cola brand that continues to register groundbreaking sales globally (Shimp, & Andrews, 2013: 112).

Sales Promotion

Although the Coca-Cola brand is known and recognized globally, the company continues to promote the product intermittently through unique promotional strategies that reignite customer enthusiasm. This kind of promotion is meant to increase sales for a short period because it involves offering the Coca-Cola brand at affordable prices in specific locations where some consumers can access the products. The company engages the consumers through various techniques to realize short bursts of sales. Some of these techniques include consumer-orientated sales promotion that involves getting the brand in shelves in a conspicuous manner, especially in retail stores. Additionally, the multinational practice trade-oriented promotion that involves offering discounts to wholesalers and retailers who purchase the Coca-Cola brand in bulk. The technique works by offering such traders free tours, free products, and return back allowances as a way of encouraging the trader to buy more of the Coca-Cola brand (Glaser, 2008: 726-736).

Personal Selling

According to Bruce and Solomon (2013: 307-318), personal selling has been an instrumental IMC tool for the Coca-Cola-brand, especially in the past decade, considering the high number of salespeople that work for the Coca-Cola Company. The Coca-Cola Company has entered into contractual relationships with various salespeople across the globe to help promote the Coca-Cola soft drink. The individuals act as goodwill ambassadors for the company’s brand by establishing positive relationships with the consumers of Coca-Cola besides offering special services to the loyal customers. This IMC tool works effectively for the Coca-Cola brand because the salespeople are distributed all over the world and they can influence a global clientele through effective marketing communication that resonates with company policy on product promotion (Chitty, 2011: 1, 171).

Publicity/Public Relations

The Coca-Cola Company, through non-personal communications, markets the Coca-Cola brand in a publicity approach. The company has a competent public relations team that coordinates all its global public relations about Coca-Cola. The company ensures that the team cultivates and inculcates a positive attitude in the public regarding the Coca-Cola brand. Since the brand is consistent across the globe, the public relations team attempts to be consistent in their communications as much as possible so that customers from all over the world get the same positive message. The aim of public relations/publicity is not just to gain brand popularity but to make the public accept and understand the Coca-Cola brand in a more in-depth manner. This process involves addressing a number of activities that may be seemingly unclear to the public (Bruce & Solomon, 2013: 307-318).

With the understanding of the impact of public opinion on its brands, the Coca-Cola Company uses its public relations strategies to dispel rumors about the Coca-Cola brand besides setting the record clear about lawsuits regarding the soft drink. For many years, critics and malicious parties have written about the Coca-Cola brand in an adverse manner, which has prompted the company to rise out to the public on many occasions in defense of its primary product. Stakeholder confidence is an important aspect in the marketing communications of Coca-Cola and publicity is one of the most portent ways of restoring stakeholder confidence, particularly in situations where the integrity of the brand has been injured or tainted. Through various corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives such as sponsoring football and community projects, the Coca-Cola Company has restored the brand identity and reputation of Coca-Cola (Singh, 2014: 1116-1124).

Recommendations for Diet Coke

Based on the findings from the Coca-Cola IMC analysis, specifically from a practitioner and academic stance, various recommendations can be drawn for a future Integrated Marketing Communications campaign for Diet Coke, which is a different product in the same category as Coca-Cola. Diet Coke, unlike the conventional Coca-Cola, is largely unknown for its calorific value and uniqueness. With this regard, it will be relevant to use the insight gained from the Coca-Cola IMC analysis to come up with appropriate recommendations for Diet Coke. Such recommendations will delve mainly in the future integrated marketing communications of the brand in order to ignite a message and stay consistent with customer expectations. The recommendations ought to be implemented within a specified timeline as indicated in the Appendix (Shimp, & Andrews, 2013: 112).

The future IMC for Diet Coke ought to incorporate a dynamic shift in terms of the marketing approach and strategies, owing to the changing world and consumer expectations. Unlike the Coca-Cola brand that has been in existence for many decades, Diet Coke is an emerging brand that requires robust marketing communications from all centers to trigger and retain consumer enthusiasm (Matovic, Knezevic, & Brankov, 2015: 141-154). Accordingly, the Coca-Cola Company needs to shift its advertising of the Diet Coke from the conventional means of advertising such as mass media to the digital advertising platforms. Although mass media forms such as print, television, billboard, and radio target a wide audience, the digital platform allows for more interactive communications than the traditional advertising. Accordingly, specialized media would be preferable to the mass media as far as the IMC of Diet Coke is concerned (Chitty, 2011: 103, 171).

Promotional mix should be enhanced on the basis on performance and accountability in order to enhance the marketing mix of Diet Coke. The Coca-Cola Company has used such IMC tools as advertising, direct marketing, internet/interactive marketing, sales promotion, personal selling, and publicity/public relations, which are essential components of its promotional mix, to drive its synchronized marketing communications agenda (Singh, 2014: 1116-1124). The company can do the same for Diet Coke albeit with an enhanced focus on accountability and focus. The focus should shift from low to high agency accountability to ensure that every resource spent on marketing communication is accounted for at all levels. Additionally, all the agencies and salespeople involved in marketing communication should receive their compensation based on their performance rather than the accomplishment of their missions. This strategy will increase the focus of all the marketing teams to consolidate their efforts towards changing the perceptions of customers towards Diet Coke. Besides, other key trends are likely to change the marketing communication of Diet Coke if the multinational adopts them effectively (Kotler, 2013: 1, 18, 76).

Emotional marketing will play a significant role in influencing the perceptions and buying behaviors of consumers towards Diet Coke, considering that the Coca-Cola Company has successfully used the strategy in the past. Emotional marketing entails drifting away from the usual corporate messages to more touching narratives about the product, which in this case is Diet Coke (Matovic, Knezevic, & Brankov, 2015: 141-154). The brand will sell if the company adopts a marketing strategy that elucidates on how taking the product will ‘open happiness’ to consumers, giving real-life examples to back the statement. Using human examples is an effective and efficient marketing communication because it enhances the credibility of the product in the customers’ viewpoint. For instance, the marketing communications ought to offer the advantages of Diet Coke over other beverages in terms of calorific value and emotional wellbeing. This strategy can work well with partners in other areas such as blogging (Chitty, 2011: 279).

Influencer marketing is a marketing communication strategy that promises to be the new trend that the Coca-Cola Company should employ in drawing the attention of internet users towards Diet Coke. Currently, a vast majority of soft drink consumers are no longer moved by the fancy advertisements on mass media. The internet is dramatically shaping the advertisement industry as the vast majority of corporate entities have joined digital marketing. However, most internet users rarely visit company websites unless they have compelling issues. It means that the Coca-Cola Company will have to liaise with bloggers who command huge online following. Instead of the company having the users block its ads, it can subcontract the marketing communication to bloggers, who may influence internet users positively towards liking and buying Diet Coke (Bhojanna, 2007: 229).

In conclusion, the Coca-Cola Company has an elaborate integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) for its famous brand, the Coca-Cola. The integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) of the company for the Coca-Cola brand entails the use of both conventional and unorthodox marketing strategies to drive a reliable agenda about the brand. The multinational embarked on robust marketing campaigns for its Coca-Cola soft drink brand in a bid to create a sense of happiness in the consumption of the product. The Coca-Cola Company has used such IMC tools as advertising, direct marketing, internet/interactive marketing, sales promotion, personal selling, and publicity/public relations, which are essential components of its promotional mix, to drive its synchronized marketing communications agenda (Kotler, 2013: 1, 18, 76).

Based on the findings from the Coca-Cola IMC analysis from a practitioner and academic standpoints, certain recommendations can work for a future Integrated Marketing Communications campaign for Diet Coke. The Coca-Cola Company is dominant in the global soft drink industry, its consistent marketing communication strategies have enabled it to stay afloat for decades with the Coca-Cola brand leading the global market in terms of sales and publicity. Such recommendations include influencer marketing, emotional marketing, promotional mix based on performance & accountability, and a gradual shift from mass media to internet marketing (Shimp, & Andrews, 2013: 112).

Reference List

Shimp, T. A., & Andrews, J. C. (2013) Advertising, promotion, and other aspects of integrated marketing communications. Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning.

Kotler, P. (2013) Marketing insights from a to z 80 concepts every manager needs to know. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley.

Bhojanna, S. N. M. (2007) Advertising: an IMC perspective. London: Excel Books.

Chitty, W. (2011) Integrated marketing communication. South Melbourne, Vic: Cengage Learning.

Matovic, V., Knezevic, M. And Brankov, T.P. (2015) ‘The necessity to adjust traditional integrated marketing communications tools and techniques to new global trends’, Ekonomika, 61(4): 141-154.

Singh, T. (2014) ‘A quasi-experimental study to assess the impact of cause-related marketing on brand attitude and purchase intention’, International Journal of Retailing & Rural Business Perspectives, 3(3): 1116-1124.

Glaser, S., 2008 ‘The role of branding in the value chain’, International Journal of Physical Distribution & Logistics Management, 38(9): 726-736.

Bruce, M. and Solomon, M.R., 2013. Managing for media anarchy: a corporate marketing perspective’, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 21(3): 307-318.